Thursday, 21 June 2007

To this day I have to pause and mentally sort this one out in order to get it right. As with any of the other common mistakes people make when writing, it’s taking that moment to get it right that makes the difference.

“Affect” is a verb, as in “Your ability to communicate clearly will affect your income immensely.” “Effect” is a noun, as in “The effect of a parent’s low income on a child’s future is well documented.” By thinking in terms of “the effect,” you can usually sort out which is which, because you can’t stick a “the” in front of a verb. While some people do use “effect” as a verb (“a strategy to effect a settlement”), they are usually lawyers, and you should therefore ignore them if you want to write like a human.

In the United Kingdom, “practice” is the noun, “practise” the verb; but in the U.S. the spelling “practice” is commonly used for both, though the distinction is sometimes observed. “Practise” as a noun is, however, always wrong in both places: a doctor always has a “practice,” never a “practise.”

Source : http://www.wsu.edu

We may compare with the following explanation :

Practice is a nounFor example: We need to put these ideas into practice.

Practise is a verbFor example: To learn English well you have to practise.

Both of them is correct. We have to know when we use practice and practise

“Maybe” is an adverb meaning “perhaps,” so if you are uncertain whether to use this word or the phrase “may be,” try substituting “perhaps”: “Maybe she forgot I said I’d meet her at six o’clock” becomes “Perhaps she forgot. . . .” When the substitution makes sense, go with one word: “maybe.” When you are wondering whether you may be waiting in the wrong cafe, you’re dealing with a verb and its auxiliary: “may be.” Two words.

People say they want to help the problem of poverty when what they really mean is that they want to help solve the problem of poverty. Poverty flourishes without any extra help, thank you. I guess I know what a “suicide help line” is, but I’d rather it were a “suicide prevention help line.” I suppose it’s too late to ask people to rename alcoholism support groups as sobriety support groups, but it’s a shoddy use of language.

“Xmas” is not originally an attempt to exclude Christ from Christmas, but uses an abbreviation of the Greek spelling of the word “Christ” with the “X” representing the Greek letter chi. However, so few people know this that it is probably better not to use this popular abbreviation in religious contexts.

“Besides” can mean “in addition to” as in “besides the puppy chow, Spot scarfed up the filet mignon I was going to serve for dinner.”

“Beside,” in contrast, usually means “next to.” “I sat beside Cheryl all evening, but she kept talking to Jerry instead.” Using “beside” for “besides,” won’t usually get you in trouble; but using “besides” when you mean "next to” will.

"We were supposed to go to the dance last night, however, it was cancelled because of lack of interest." This is INCORRECT.

A semicolon, rather than a comma, should be used to link these two complete sentences:* "We were supposed to go to the dance last night; however, it was cancelled because of lack of interest." This is CORRECT.

It should be noted that there ARE situations in which you can use a comma instead of a semi-colon:* "The match at Wimbledon, however, continued despite the bad weather." This is CORRECT.

There is only one complete sentence in this example. It is not a compound sentence.

Monday, 11 June 2007

The correct sentence is what's about not how's about.You have to say what's about this proposal instead of saying how's about this proposal.What's about actually means how's about.So the correct one should be WHAT'S ABOUT.

We often find this word our daily email communication. What's wrong with the words? Which one is the correct one according to "The should be English" grammar?

People use this word to express thanks a lot. The correct word to express thanks a lot is "THANKS". "Thank's" is not correct because thank is a singular noun. For plural noun is no need to use single apostrophe before ‘s’. So the correct one is THANKS not THANK’S. We can not say book’s but books for many books

If we are working in the office environment which using email for internal communication. I believe you will frequently find words like “Please advise” and “Please advice”. Now the question? Which one is the correct one? How to say it based on “The should be English” grammar? Let’s analyze.Based on the dictionary, “advise” is a verb and “advice” is a noun. Based on the normal sentence, it should be Subject + Verb. So the correct one should be please advise not please advice. If you want to use advice, you may say “please give advice”.

About Me

I have a good chance to get a formal English education in an academy of foreign language in Jakarta. This blog is dedicated for information sharing among us. Mainly for the common mistake we frequently make in our daily activity. Stay tunned...
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About Me

IT background person who loves human interest. Wish to contribute for a better world. Have one and the only one wife and two children. They contributed a lot for my life. My God is everything for me. Without Him, I am nothing.